HD3850 aiming for 150 euro market

An Austrian retailer has listed a couple of Sapphire HD3850 cards this weekend. The 256MB version, designated Sapphire Technology 21121-00-20R, is priced at €156, here, while the 512MB card, designated 11121-00-20R, is priced at €171, here.

A German retailer is offering Sapphire's HD3870 (21122-00-20R) with 512MB of GDDR4 memory for €219, here. The HD3870 is pitted against Nvidia's 8800 GT, which is listed at as little as €200, but at the moment it's plagued by availability issues.

While the HD3870 has the 8800 GT to worry about, the HD3850 is sailing in much calmer waters. At a €150 price tag, Nvidia has nothing to counter it and it's set to cause quite a stir in the mid-range market. We wouldn't be much surprised if they end up a bit more expensive at launch, but this should be close to the right price.